


Place Your Hand On My Beating Heart

by orphan_account



Category: Teen Titans (Animated Series)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-24
Packaged: 2018-04-19 12:19:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4746248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Raven is honored by the city with a gala, she must learn to dance. Enter...Beast Boy? Over several lessons, Raven and Beast Boy confront their shared past...and maybe take steps toward a better future. Partially inspired by the music video for Ed Sheeran's "Thinking Out Loud." Rated M for semi-explicit sexual content.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. What I Should Have Said

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Teen Titans or "Thinking Out Loud"

The project started with Melvin, Timmy, and Teether. When Raven protected them from the Brotherhood of Evil, she grew attached, and she soon started to wonder what would happen to them when her protection was no longer needed. They hadn't mentioned any family other than each other, and, as young as they were, there had been no cries to go home. None of them had talked about a home of any kind, so where would they go?

In their case, it was back where Dick found them: was an overcrowded orphanage in Bludhaven. Raven was infuriated when she learned this, and she hounded Dick and Vic for months to get them transferred to California. Eventually, they were put in a much nicer foster home in Jump City, and Raven visited them weekly. Afterward, Raven started thinking. What if she hadn't found them? What would have happened to them then? What happened to other children like them? They were too young to effectively fight crime, to be a part of a team. Where did they go?

After a lot of thinking, Raven finally figured out her answer. They ended up like Terra. They ended up stumbling around trying to good, but with their lack of control, they harmed as much they helped. Eventually, they either got themselves hurt or killed, and all the while, they never truly belonged anywhere. Raven realized then how lucky she'd been in finding the Titans. Any one of them, with the exception of Dick, could have ended up like Terra. Melvin, Timmy, and Teether _definitely_ could have ended up like Terra if Raven hadn't found them, and as far as she knew, there could be hundreds more metahuman kids just like them that she _didn't_ know about. She knew that they needed a place to belong.

Raven didn't know how _she_ could provide such a place, especially if others hadn't done it already, but she decided she wanted to try. Little by little, she worked towards that goal. She bought a large house in a mostly abandoned suburb outside of Jump City. With Vic's help, she fixed it up and outfitted it to house people with a variety of abilities, and they set up security measures. Raven then asked Jinx how the H.I.V.E. Academy went about finding their students, and then she and Vic tried to replicate their system. She set up a mission statement and began letting people outside of her acquaintance know what she wanted to do. Her goal wasn't to groom future heroes or villains. Instead, she wanted to provide a safe place for metahuman children and teenagers to stay. She also wanted to help them learn to control their powers, and she asked every hero she was in contact with to help her with that if their particular skills were needed. Nearly all of them supported her efforts, and Raven even started getting calls from members of the Justice League, offering to help. She'd put a lot of work into this project, and after eight years, it was finally becoming a reality. In two months, the Jump City Home for Metahuman Youth would open.

She only had to get through this _gala_. The mayor, who'd been opposed to the youth home until about two years ago, insisted on throwing it. Dick insisted that Raven go. This project was _her_ baby after all, and her refusal to attend would send the wrong message to the press. He'd never been able to give her a straight answer when she asked what exactly that message was; he'd just assured it would be the wrong one. After an argument that went on for several days, she finally agreed to go, thinking she could simply sit at a partially hidden corner table until it was all over.

Dick had quickly disabused her of that notion however. This was _her_ project. _She_ would be the one interacting with the press. _She_ would be the one soliciting benefactors. He promised that he and their teammates would help her, but she would be the one everyone _really_ wanted to talk to, and she wasn't allowed to hide from them. She was to talk and smile and dance with a bunch of complete strangers who had no respect for her privacy and most likely thought that the youth home she'd worked on since she was seventeen was some kind of political statement.

She would honestly rather pluck out her own eyeballs and eat them in front of a live studio audience.

What worried her most, as ridiculous as it was, was that she would be expected to _dance._ She could answer questions. She could ask for money. She might not be particularly charming about either of those things, but she could do them. And she would even try to be charming if it meant helping the youth home. However, one thing she could not do was dance. Period. She never understood the point of it, and so she never tried to learn.

In two months however, she would spend most of a night dancing with some very important people, and while she doubted their decision to donate to the youth home would hinge on her dancing ability, she still wanted to make a decent impression. She was a professional with an important goal, and it would be hard to get that across to someone if she was stumbling around like an idiot. She had to take...dance lessons.

Her first idea was to find a studio in town and pay an instructor. However, the idea of staggering around a dance floor in front of a complete stranger was not an appealing one. And the possibility that said stranger might sell stories of her incompetence to the media made the entire thing unpalatable. Raven would much prefer to do this in house.

Dick was the most obvious choice. He frequently attended events like this, both here and in Gotham, and he had a very privileged upbringing. Obviously, he would know how to ballroom dance. However, Raven would rather pick the most gossipy dance instructor in Jump City than ask Dick to teach her to dance. As far as she knew, there was only other person in her acquaintance who knew how to ballroom dance.

“Rita wanted to make sure her boy could waltz,” Gar had told her once, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

However, she didn't think she wanted to ask Gar any more than she wanted to ask Dick. Gar had only recently returned to the Tower after nearly a year in Atlanta, where he'd been leading the Titans South. Though she hadn't liked the idea at first, Raven agreed now that the assignment had been a necessary one. Things were better between her and Gar, but it was still awkward between them, at least to her. She wasn't sure how she felt about spending extended periods of time alone with him, even if it was for something as stupid as learning to dance. And that was assuming he'd even agree. Raven really wasn't sure he would.

For the better part of an afternoon, she thought it over. Dick was not an option, that was for sure. Part of the reason their argument about her attending the gala had taken so long was because she still couldn't tolerate being in the same room with him for more than a few minutes at a time. Just looking at him was enough to infuriate her sometimes, and she knew she wouldn't learn anything from him until she got past that. She knew she would forgive him eventually, but it would not be soon.

She considered the outside dance instructor more seriously once she realized who her options in the tower were, but the idea was soon discarded. There was simply no way to ensure confidentiality...not unless she was in the mood to pay a lawyer to draw up a confidentiality agreement, hunt down an instructor willing to sign it, and then pay the instructor watch her embarrass herself. She was not in that particular mood.

So, that left Gar. She wasn't mad at him, he wouldn't sell the story for the press to make fun of, and he could dance. She only hoped he wasn't mad at her. With some reluctance, she finally left her room and made her way to the ops center. She found him in the kitchen area, making some kind of tofu dish.

“Gar,” she said, making him look up. Resisting the urge to turn and leave as quickly as dignity allowed, she greeted him. “Uh...hey.”

He looked slightly puzzled for a moment before giving a little shrug and smiling. “Hey, Raven.” He focused on his cooking again.

“You know that, uh, Dick is making me go to that party...er, gala...thingright?” She cursed her lack of eloquence.

“Yeah, for that youth home you've been working on.” He looked up at her again, still smiling, and her breath hitched a little. “I've been meaning to congratulate you, but...I'm kinda spacey, I guess. So, congratulations! You worked really hard, and you're doin' a great thing.”

Raven felt something tighten in her chest, and she took a deep breath, trying to be discreet about it. He was being so nice. For some reason, that made her feel guilty. She almost wished he would act angry.

“Thanks,” she said, pushing her strange feelings aside. “It, uh, means a lot to me. Enough for me to go to this party thing anyway. And actually, I um, need to ask you something.”

Gar stopped stirring his food. Now, he looked kind of cautious. “Okay...?”

“Dick says I have to dance. I can't dance, but I have to, and I was wondering if you would teach me, because I remember you said once that you knew how to ballroom dance, or at least waltz...” She was so caught up in her rambling—and hating herself for rambling—that she almost missed his answer.

“Sure, Raven.”

She stopped babbling. “Really?”

He shrugged. “Sure. I'm just surprised you asked me though. Seems like Dick would be the better choice.”

“I didn't want to ask Dick.”

“How come?” he asked curiously.

“I just didn't want to,” she replied, hoping he would leave it at that.

He looked like he wanted to say more, but he shrugged and went back to his cooking instead. After a moment of silence, Raven figured their conversation was over. She turned to leave, and he suddenly called her name.

“Yes?” she asked, turning back around.

“When did you want to start?”

“I'm not sure,” she admitted. “When do you think we should?”

He looked thoughtful. “It's probably best to get as much practice as you can,” he said after a few seconds. “Is tomorrow okay?”

 _Tomorrow?!_ She shrieked internally. On the outside though, she was calm.

“Tomorrow is fine.”

“Okay,” Gar said. “You still, uh, meditate around five?” He rubbed the back of his neck.

Raven felt the tightness in her chest return. _He remembered._

“Yeah.”

“Then how about we meet in the gym around three? That should give us plenty of time.”

“Okay,” replied Raven. “I'll see you tomorrow.” She tried to make sure it didn't sound like a question.

“See you tomorrow,” Gar confirmed.

 


	2. Partition

At three on the dot, Raven entered the gym and found Gar waiting in the area where the team usually sparred. She thought there was something oddly appropriate about that.

“Are you ready to experience the _wonders_ of ballroom dance?” Gar asked with mock enthusiasm.

Raven couldn't help glaring at him, and he grinned at her.

“I appreciate your excitement,” he said.

“So, what are we doing?” Raven asked, ignoring his attempts at humor.

“Explanation time!” he replied, straightening so quickly he actually jumped a little. “Standard ballroom includes Waltz, Viennese waltz, Tango, Foxtrot, Quickstep, Samba, Cha-Cha-Cha, Rumba, Paso Doble, and Jive.”

Raven gaped at him. “You made at least half of those up.”

Gar laughed. “I wish. And that's just the international standard. They _could_ stick to all-American.”

“Does that...style have a lot of different ones?” Raven asked, dreading the answer.

Gar shook his head. “Not really. It's about the same except American swaps out the last three dances I said for the East Coast Swing, Rumba, and Bolero.”

“How do you even remember all of this?” Raven wondered aloud. Even though Gar was far more focused now that he'd been when she met him, he still had a fairly short attention span.

At this, Gar dropped his overenthusiastic instructor persona. “Dude, I don't even know. I thought it was all gone, but when I started thinking about it again, I started remembering. Rita made me spend _a lot_ of time on the dance floor.”

“We're not going to have to learn all of them, are we?” Raven asked, hoping he would say 'no.'

“Nah,” Gar replied. “East Coast Swing is probably blasphemy out here in Cali, and since this shindig wants to be all fancy, they'll probably stick to international stuff. But, we're gonna focus on the first five I said, 'cause those are, like, the most common, and if we still have time when you get those down, we'll do the basics for the rest.”

Overwhelmed, Raven didn't speak for a moment, and Gar gave her a sympathetic smile.

“Hey, Raven? It's just waltz today. That's it.”

Cautiously, she nodded.

“Okay,” said Gar. He moved over to the stereo, took his iPod from his pocket, and plugged it in. Classical music began to pour from the speakers, but to Raven's surprise, Gar simply sat down. She walked over to the stereo and looked down at him, hands on her hips.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

He took her arm and gently tugged her to sit on the floor with him.

“The thing about the waltz,” he explained once she was settled. “the thing about all the ballroom dances, really, is that they all got their own time signature. Waltz is in three-four time. It's important to know that, because if you know how to count, you can always find your way back if you get lost. We'll listen to the music first, count, and _then_ move onto steps. Listen.”

They were both silent for a moment, paying attention to the music, and then Gar started to count, tapping his hand against his leg. “One, two, three. One, two, three. Can, you, hear? It, Ra, ven? One, two, three...”

She listened to the music and focused on his tapping fingers. Eventually, she could hear the beats in the song landing at the same time his fingers did. After watching for another moment, she too began to count and tap her fingers against her leg. All the while, it didn't escape her notice that he still held her arm.

**~O~**

_“Hey, Rae?” Beast Boy asked far too innocently._

_Raven let out a frustrated huff and looked up from his freshly healed leg. “I_ told _you not to—”_

_His lips were on hers before she could finish._

_Her eyes went wide, and she froze, too shocked to move. When her brain started functioning again, she was surprised to realize that she hadn't pushed him away yet. She thought that would have been instinctive for her._

_The bigger surprise however, was that she wasn't sure she_ wanted _to push him away. The kiss actually felt...nice. He didn't thoughtlessly crush his mouth against hers, and he wasn't trying to force his tongue in her mouth. Instead, he was slow and gentle, his lips moving softly over hers. If she didn't think the word was so far removed from anything she associated with Beast Boy, she would have called it sensual. He ran his the tip of his tongue over the crease between her lips, but before she could open her mouth, he pulled away, mischievous expression still on his face._

_Well, that wouldn't do at all._

_Raven found she was still curious about all a kiss could entail. She pressed her mouth back to his before he could speak, and this time he was the one who froze, mouth gaping. Raven had no problem with this. She had...experimenting to do. She kissed his top lip first, catching it between her own for a moment before letting go, and then she moved to the bottom one. Confidence growing, she flicked it with her tongue and then gently bit down. She moved back a little, dragging his lip with her, and he made a strange, whimpering sound. She let go and gave his lip a critical look. It didn't_ look _like she'd hurt him. Deciding he was fine, she pressed her mouth back to his and tentatively slid her tongue in, exploring. It was interesting, but she felt like there was something missing._

_That feeling disappeared when the tip of her tongue touched Beast Boy's. He startled a little, and then he reacted. His tongue met and began to move with hers, and Raven felt his hands tangle in her hair. He started stroking the hair at the nape of her neck, and she shuddered a little. That felt really nice._

_This kiss started out as slow and gentle as the first, one-sided ones, but the two of them moving together was something completely different. It sent chills down her spine, and she felt like her blood itself was buzzing. The kiss quickly escalated into a completely different one, something hotter and hungrier with a lot of biting and licking and sucking, and when Raven broke away for a quick breath of air, she was surprised to find she was in Beast Boy's lap._

_Uncomfortable with how far this had gone, she quickly pushed herself off of him, seating herself several inches away._

_“What...was that?” Beast Boy panted._

_Raven, who'd been looking away, whirled to look at him. What did he mean? Was she bad? But—_

_“You started it,” she sputtered._

_“I didn't think you'd continue it!” he exclaimed. His expression turned sheepish. “I thought you'd hit me or something.”_

_“Did you want me to hit you?” Raven's voice was flat._

_“It was less about you hitting me and more about me seeing you get all flustered,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. “But then you ruined my plans.” He tried to tease._

_“Sorry,” she said stiffly. She got up, but he took her arm._

_“Uh...why_ did _you kiss me back, Raven?”_

_“I was...curious,” she admitted after she thought about it for a minute._

_“Really?” Beast Boy looked amazed at the very idea._

_“Yes,” Raven replied. “It felt kind of nice, so I wanted to see what would happen. Best case scenario: it would be enjoyable for both of us. Worst case scenario: the emotions from the kiss would stir up my powers, and you'd be destroyed. Which you would have deserved anyway for kissing me without my permission just to 'fluster' me. I thought it was a win-win.”_

_Beast Boy laughed, and Raven almost smiled._

_“Hey, Raven?” he asked once he'd gotten control of himself._

_“Yes, Beast Boy?”_

_“Do you, uh...wanna do it again some time?”_

_“You want to?” Raven asked, surprised._

_“Well...” Beast Boy shrugged. “Yeah. It was fun. I really liked it.”_

_Raven thought about it for a moment. She'd never thought about Beast Boy this way before. Never thought about_ anyone _this way before, brief infatuations with Aqualad and Malchior excluded. She wasn't sure if she thought of Beast Boy romantically now, but she had really enjoyed kissing him, as surprising as that was. And she would like to do it again. After a moment, she realized that they really didn't need to be a couple. They could just be friends who...fooled around? Whatever the term was. She didn't think he was looking for a relationship from her either, so this could be fun._

_“Okay,” she said._

_“Really?” he asked, once again looking amazed._

_“No,” Raven replied, rolling her eyes. “I actually want to kiss Cyborg.”_

_“Uh...really?” Beast Boy looked somewhere between crestfallen and confused, and she wanted to roll her eyes again._

_“I was being sarcastic. Yes, I actually want to kiss you again,” Raven replied. God knew why._

_“Oh, okay,” Beast Boy said happily, and Raven almost smiled again._

**~O~**

When the song ended, Gar stood up and offered her his hand. She stood up without taking it, and he shrugged. He turned off the music, and she gave him a quizzical look.

“We gotta learn steps first,” he said. “Then, we'll put them to music. Remember the counting though. Okay?”

Raven nodded and turned to face him. He took her hands, placing one on his shoulder and holding the other in the air with his own. He moved his free hand to her waist and pulled her close—much closer than she would have expected for such a formal dance. She shot him a look, and he smiled sheepishly at her.

“We actually do have to get this close, for a lot of the dances actually. Sorry in advance for getting up in your personal space.”

**~O~**

_The ops center was blissfully empty. Raven wasn't sure where the rest of her teammates were, but she was too appreciative of the quiet to wonder about it too much. She started boiling water for her tea and took a yogurt from the refrigerator to eat while she waited. When she finished it, she idly reached into the pocket of her cloak for a book, but then she realized she wasn't wearing it. She was wearing civvies, a tank top and shorts. They were easier to get into than her regular uniform. And easier to get out of. She blushed slightly._

_It had been a month since Beast Boy had kissed in the med bay and she'd agreed to let him keep doing it. She had also agreed to try...other things with him over the last few weeks. This new physical aspect to their relationship developed much faster than Raven thought it would. In fact, she'd never considered going as far as she had with Beast Boy, and yet she didn't want to stop. It was like an addiction. One kiss and she was swept away on a high and then demanding more. Kisses led to touches and then somehow they were naked. And this was by the second week. They hadn't had sex then—she didn't feel like she was ready—but Beast Boy showed her a lot of other things they could do. Her favorite thing involved the use of his prehensile tongue._

_Soon, she was initiating their contact, yanking him into her room when he was passing by and tugging his uniform off as quickly as she could. He was just as bold, which would have annoyed her in any other situation, but only served to arouse her when it came to this. Being wanted was as intoxicating as the sensations he invoked in her. It had gotten so that they couldn't go a day wouldn't without getting each other off at least once, usually more._

_She and Beast Boy finally did have sex a couple of nights ago, and though it had been a bit awkward for her at first, he'd been good to her, and she'd enjoyed it. She had definitely enjoyed it since. She'd never tell Beast Boy—his ego didn't need the feeding—but she couldn't get enough of him._

_She was pulled from her thoughts when she felt something touching her hips. She stiffened when she realized they were hands and then relaxed when she looked down and saw they were green. It seemed that thinking of him made him appear, she thought idly as she felt him start to press kisses against the back of her neck._

_“Someone...could come in,” she said, even as she tilted her head to give him better access. She focused on the knobs on the stove and turned off the burner under her water. Once that was done, her eyes dropped closed, and she relaxed against him, focusing on the feel of his lips on her neck. She sighed when she felt teeth scrape the sensitive skin._

_His mouth moved to her ear, lips brushing the shell. “Starfire's out shopping. Cyborg's out getting car parts, and Robin's in the middle of his morning workout. You know he won't be out of there until like 9:30. At the earliest.” He kissed the shell of her ear and started nibbling on the lobe._

_“My tea...” She gestured vaguely to the stove. Raven knew she already going to do anything Beast Boy wanted, but she had to make at least a token protest._

_“_ I'll _make you tea,” he said, yanking her against him. A thrill jolted through her when she felt his hardness against her ass. His hands moved under shirt and up towards her chest._

_“You don't know how to make my tea.” She gasped when hands closed over her breasts and squeezed._

_“Boil water...” He kissed her neck. “Pour in cup...” Bite. “Empty cup...” His left hand moved to her right breast and began to tease and pluck at her nipple. “Pour more...so it stays hot” He pinched her nipple hard, and she whimpered at the shard of sensation it sent through her. “Add tea leaves...” She felt his other hand sliding down her stomach. “Wait a bit...” He stopped at the waistband of her shorts, tantalizingly stroking the place where skin met fabric. She let out a needy whine and arched her back, making him laugh softly. “Add honey...” His hand slipped under the fabric, and she let out a relieved moan. “Easy enough,” he joked as his fingers began to move teasingly over her outer lips._

_“How?” She tried to get her brain working properly again. “How could you possibly know that?” she challenged, trying to tease._

_If possible, he pulled her even closer, and when two fingers slid inside her, she let out a choked gasp. “Do you think,” he asked, his breath hot in her ear. “now that I've seen all of you, that I'll ever be able to stop looking at you?”_

**~O~**

Gar got Raven through about half the steps of the waltz, and then he started over again, leading her through the steps until they got to where they left off.

“One, two, three. One, two, three,” he chanted. “You, are, way. Too, stiff, now. It's, like, dan. Cing with wood. One, two, three. One, two, three.”

“I don't know what I'm doing!” Raven snapped.

“It'll get better if you just relax,” Gar replied patiently.

“I can't relax if I don't know what I'm doing.”

 _Or with you so close,_ she thought.

“But you're learning, so _relax_.”

Raven huffed and continued to follow him through the steps.

Gar let out an exasperated sigh and stopped. He took Raven by the shoulders and started to shake her gently. “You need to relax...” His voice trembled from the shaking he was giving Raven. “Dancing involves movement, not standing like a board...”

She smacked his hands away. “Quit it. And I'm _trying_ to relax. It's just...not happening.” She let out another annoyed huff.

Gar looked at her for a moment and then shrugged. “Okay, so I guess that's it for today.”

“Really?” Raven asked, surprised and a little...disappointed.

“Yep. You can take some time to let what you've already learned sink in, and then maybe you'll be more relaxed tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“It took us...” Gar looked at the clock on the wall. “about two hours to learn half a dance. There's still another four and a half dances to learn completely and maybe another five to learn the basics for. We got eight weeks.” He raised an eyebrow at her, and she sighed.

“Point taken. Thanks for doing this. I'll see you, Gar.”

**~O~**

_“Beast Boy!” she cried, and he stopped moving. She let out a whine and and tried to lift her hips, but he held her in place._

_“Gar,” he panted._

_“What?” she asked, only wanting him to start moving again._

_“My real name. It's Gar. When we're doing_ this... _” He gave a sharp thrust, and Raven let out a guttural moan. “call me that. Please?”_

_“'kay,” she panted, pulling his mouth back to hers. She let out another whine when he started moving again._

**~O~**

The next day, she met Gar at the same place and time. The first thing they did was go through the first half of the waltz several times, speeding up a little more each time, and Raven was pleased to realize that he'd been right yesterday. The steps had sunk in, and it was a little bit easier to relax. That changed when he started teaching her the second half though.

“You're getting stiff again, Raven.”

“No idea what I'm doing,” she reminded him. She was never sure where she was supposed to step, and it felt like Gar kept crowding her. His hand moved from her waist to the middle of her back and started to pull her closer, and she quickly took a step back. He did as well and looked away. After a second, he spoke.

“Let's go back to the last position you know and try it again. You'll get this.” He offered her his hand, and she hesitantly reached out and took it. He placed his other hand at her waist and stepped close to her. She resisted the urge to move back.

**~O~**

_“There's this book fair thing coming up,” commented Gar._

_Curious, Raven turned to look at him. In the six months since this all started, this was the first time he'd mentioned something like this when he was in her bed. Usually when they talked, it was about sex or their friends. She sat up, unmindful of her nakedness, and gave Gar a quizzical look. “A book fair?”_

_“It sounds kinda like a Con thing to me. A bunch of authors getting together and doing, like, panels to talk about their books and stuff they're planning. There's also signings and merch and junk,” he explained._

_“Merch?” Raven asked._

_“Merchandise,” Gar replied, emphasizing the first syllable._

_Admittedly, Raven thought it sounded like something she might want to go to. She was confused as to why Beast Boy—_ Gar, _she reminded herself—was talking to her about it though._

_“Okay...?” she asked slowly._

_“So, you wanna go with me?” he asked._

_“With_ you _?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. That was a surprise. “Why would you be interested in a book fair?”_

_“Nathan Fowler's gonna be there!” he said excitedly._

_“Who?”_

_He gave her a disappointed look. “Hello? Nathan Fowler? Coolest graphic novelist in recent years? Hell yeah, I'm going. But I thought it might be something you'd be into, so I invited you. You wanna go?”_

_“I don't know,” she said. “Maybe. If I know any of the authors there.”_

_He reached out and tapped the book on her nightstand_. _“This author's going to be there.”_

 _“What?”_ _she asked, trying not to let excitement creep into her tone. That was her favorite modern author._

_Gar propped himself up on his elbows to get a better look at her book. “Yeah, Aaron...Milton. Sounds right. Pretty sure he's on the list.”_

_“Okay, then I think I'll go,” said Raven._

_“Cool,” Gar replied, laying back down. He was quiet for a moment, and then he said, “I want to have sex again.”_

_Raven gave him a look. “Really?”_

_“Hey, I was just sayin.'”_

_“Uh-huh.” Raven rolled her eyes, but she threw a leg over his hips anyway._

**~O~**

It was awkward, but towards the end of the lesson, she and Gar had managed to work their way through the second half of the waltz. They went back to the halfway point and repeated the steps several times until Raven actually started to feel comfortable. Now that she knew where to step and how to keep an appropriate distance between herself and Gar, she was more relaxed.

“Think you can handle going _way_ back to the first half?” Gar asked, smiling at her. He appeared to be pleased with her progress.

Raven gave him a look. “Yes. I can handle the first half of the waltz,” she drawled. “I can probably do the entire thing now.”

“Okay...” Gar replied, sounding like he knew something she didn't.

She was instantly suspicious, but she didn't ask about his tone. Instead, she simply moved back to the very first position. Or what she thought was the first position. Gar adjusted her slightly after she settled, but it didn't worry her too much. She was inexperienced after all, so it was logical that she would make mistakes.

They started to dance, and to Raven's chagrin, it seemed like she'd forgotten the first half entirely. She kept mixing steps from the second half into the first. Gar didn't rub it in, only corrected her gently, but that annoyed her further. She tried not to snap at him about it. It wasn't _his_ fault after all. Technically.

He stopped her when they got to the halfway point and started them over again, and Raven didn't protest. She did much better the second time, and when they got to the halfway point the third time, he led her through the second half of the waltz. She stumbled a little through the second part, but she didn't feel too bad about it. When they were finished, Gar stopped and smiled at her.

“And you just did the waltz. How does it feel?”

“Stupid,” she grumbled, but inside, she was kind of pleased.

Gar seemed to realize this, because he didn't appear unhappy with her reply. “You want to run through it all again?”

Wanting to make sure it wasn't a fluke, she agreed, and they moved back to their starting position. He led her through the entire waltz, and Raven was pleased to note that her steps were much smoother than they were the first time. She really was getting better at this. When they got close to the end of the dance, she gave Gar a meaningful look. He seemed to get it, because when they made it to the last step, they started over again. This time, she tried not to look at her feet, so of course, she stumbled. She glared down between them, ignoring Gar's assurances that it was fine. They did the dance one more time, this time with her watching her feet, and it went fine.

“That seem like a good stopping point?” Gar asked when they finished.

“I think so,” Raven replied. She took her hands off him and took a step back.

“I'll see you tomorrow, Raven.”

“It seems like we're progressing quickly,” Raven commented. She was beginning to wonder if it was necessary for them to meet every day.

Gar smirked at her, and Raven's guard was instantly up. She could tell the look wasn't mean-spirited, but it was obviously at her expense.

“We'll see how you feel about it tomorrow,” he said.

Raven narrowed her eyes at him. “What are you implying?”

He raised his hands in a placating gesture. “I'm not implying anything! I'm just saying we'll see how you feel about it tomorrow. If you think the waltz is solid, we'll add music.”

“Okay then,” Raven replied. “I'll see you tomorrow.”

As she left, she wondered how much difference music could make.

**~O~**

_Once they were back from working on the youth home, Raven and Gar made their way down the hall, neither of them speaking. When they got to Raven's room, she grabbed his wrist and pulled him inside. As the door slid shut, she grabbed him by the collar and shoved him back against the door, crushing her mouth to his. Today was the first time they had been able to be alone in nearly two weeks, and Raven was_ definitely _going to take advantage of it. If everything went her way, they would both be walking funny tomorrow._

_He returned the kiss fiercely, one hand tangling in her hair and the other gripping her ass, pulling her body against his and grinding._

_Her hands snaked down his chest, slid under his shirt, and started pushing the annoying garment up. She wanted it_ off. _He helped her along by lifting his arms long enough for her to pull the shirt off, and then his hands moved to her back. They slipped under her shirt and started to take it off. She was busy undoing his jeans, but when her shirt was bunched up under her arms, she reluctantly moved her hands so he could yank the shirt over her head. She immediately went back to his pants, making quick work of his belt, button, and zipper. She pushed the jeans down over his hips and gave her hand a quick lick before wrapping it around his cock. She gave it a firm squeeze, and without loosening her grip, she pulled up—slowly._

_He let out a needy moan, and she looked up, smirking, before something near his shoulder caught her eye. Puzzled, she let go of his erection, making him whine in disappointment, and moved her hand up his chest until it reached his shoulder. She ran a finger over the strange design and then looked up at him. “What is this?”_

_“Tattoo,” was his eloquent reply, and she rolled her eyes._

_“I can see that,” she replied. “Why did you get a tattoo?”_

_He shrugged, and she was momentarily distracted by the way the ink moved with the play of muscle in his shoulder and arm. “I wanted one, and this place was having, like, a special last week, so I got one.”_

_She gave him a flat look. “You got a bargain tattoo?”_

_“I think it turned out pretty good,” he said, sounding just a little bit defensive. Then, he grinned. “Besides, I think it makes me look manly and tough,” he added, deepening his voice on the last word._

_When she went more than a few seconds without replying, he started to look unsure. “You don't like it, do you?”_

_Raven stared at it for a moment, considering. She took in the black swirls of ink that wrapped around the upper part of his arm and trailed over his shoulder. Part of it even reached his chest. She wanted to lick it._

_So, she did._

_“I think I do,” she said, once she'd finished running her tongue over the parts of the design that she could reach. His mouth hung open, and his breath came out in pants._

_Over the next couple of months, he got three more tattoos on his back, arm, and chest. She wasn't sure why, but she found herself particularly fascinated with the crow in flight on his left pectoral. After he got it, she always made sure to pay particular attention to it when they were in bed._

**~O~**

Music made a lot of difference. Music made all the difference in the world. Music turned kind of decent dancing into a train wreck.

Their third lesson started out well enough. She stumbled a little the first time they ran through the waltz, but they managed to make it through all the steps. The second time, she didn't make a single mistake. By their fifth run of the dance, she was able to get through most of it without looking at her feet. She was starting to feel pretty good about this.

“Are you ready to try it with music?” asked Gar.

“Yes,” she replied, feeling fairly sure of herself.

“Okay.” He moved to the stereo and plugged in his iPod.

When the song began to play, Raven gave him a look. “That seems a little fast.”

Gar shrugged. “It's the same song I played a couple of days ago. It's about the speed waltzes usually are. Don't worry about dancing to it yet though. We're going to listen to it first and count, like we did before, and _then_ we'll try dancing to it.”

“Alright,” she replied dubiously.

He started the song over and immediately began to count, tapping his fingers against his thigh. Raven tapped her foot and tried to count silently, listening intently for when the beats landed. When the song ended, they assumed their starting positions.

And that was when it all went wrong.

The song was fast, pushing her dancing to a much higher speed than she was used to. By the third step, she was stumbling, and when they got to the halfway point, she wasn't even trying anymore. Gar was all but dragging her along as he danced. Frustrated, she shoved away from him, and he backed off, hands up. He went back to the stereo and paused the music.

“I'm never going to get this!” she seethed.

“You will,” Gar tried to soothe her. “You've only been working on this for three days.”

“Three _useless_ days _._ ”

“Hey! They have _not_ been useless. You can get all the way through the dance without messing up or looking at your feet too much. Even if you have to do it slowly, that's great for only three days of practice! When I was learning, it probably took me a week or two to get where you are!”

“Fantastic,” Raven said sarcastically. “I can dance better than a ten year old who's had two weeks of lessons.”

He walked back to her, gripped her shoulders, and looked into her eyes.

She resisted the urge to step away.

“You'll be _fine_ , Raven,” he said firmly. “You just need to keep practicing. You'll be able to speed it up. It'll just take time.”

“I don't _have_ an abundance of time,” she gritted. Now, she did step back.

“I bet you'll be able to keep up with that song by the end of the week.”

Raven huffed. “I doubt that very much.”

“It definitely won't happen if we don't practice,” Gar retorted. He held out a hand. “Come on. Let's run through it again. No music this time.”

**~O~**

_“Hey, Rae?” he said one night._

_They'd just finished having sex, the kind that was almost painfully slow and incredibly deliberate. Raven had come twice, so hard she didn't think she would ever get out of bed. She could just stay there forever with Gar. It wasn't an unappealing thought._

_“Yes, Gar?” she asked after a moment._

_“I love you.”_

_She shot upright, her breath starting to come out faster. Trying to calm herself down, she stared down at him, wide-eyed._

_He looked almost completely unconcerned about the bomb he'd just dropped. Instead, he reached out and touched her arm, running his hand up and down in what he probably thought was a soothing manner._

_It took all her willpower not to flinch violently away from him._

_“You don't have to say it back or anything—” he started._

_Raven spoke without thinking. “I think we should stop doing this.”_

_The hand on her arm stopped moving._

_“What do you mean?” he asked cautiously. He removed his hand, and part of her was relieved he was no longer touching her. She couldn't think when he was touching her; she never could._

_Another part of her didn't want to explain what she'd just said, but it was out now, and she had to follow through._

_“I think,” she said slowly, “we should stop doing this. The sex, everything.”_

_He sat up. “What?! Why?”_

_“Because I don't think this is working anymore.”_

_“Is it because of what I said?” he asked desperately. “You don't have to say it back right now, Raven! I'm not trying to pressure you or anything! Why do you want to break up?”_

_“Of course there's pressure!” Raven retorted, panic making her snap at him. She stood up, pulling the sheet around her. She needed the distance._

_“Saying 'I love you' implies you want the other person to say it back! And what do you mean 'break up?' We were never together!”_

_For a moment, Gar looked like he'd just been slapped. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and the pain on his face tore at Raven's heart._

_“What do you mean, 'not together?'” he asked with forced calm._

_“It...” She looked around helplessly. “It was just sex, Gar.”_

_That pained expression was back on his face, breaking her heart anew. She didn't like hurting her friend, but that was_ all _he was to her. They had never talked about being in a relationship, and she wasn't about to let him guilt her into one._

_Suddenly, Gar's hurt expression was replaced with anger, and he shot of bed, apparently indifferent to his own nakedness._

_Raven quickly looked up at the ceiling._

_“We've been doing this for over a year, Raven!” he yelled at her._

_“Can you...” She took a breath, still not looking at him. “Can you just put some pants on, please?”_

_Beneath her lashes, she saw Gar give her an incredulous look before muttering, “Fine.” and snatching his jeans off the floor. He yanked them on and zipped them up._

_“We gonna talk now?!” he demanded._

_She turned her attention back to him, and she regretted it immediately. Anger and pain rolled off him in waves, and it made her feel like her insides were being shredded._

_“We've been together for over a year, Raven!” he yelled at her._

_“And it was just sex!” she yelled back at him._

_“It_ was _sex! And dates! This fucking tattoo!” He gestured to the crow on his chest. “It's a relationship! We. Are. A. Couple!”_

_“What dates?!” Raven demanded. “We never went out on any dates!”_

_“We go to the movies! We go out to dinner! We went to that big book fair thing! Those are things_ couples _do, Rae! They were dates!”_

_Raven's mouth dropped open, and she gaped at him for a moment. It had never occurred to her to think of their...outings as dates. She did things with just Cyborg or Starfire all the time. It made sense that she would do something with only Gar once in a while. He was her friend too. The sex and hanging out with him had always been mutually exclusive in her mind._

_Apparently, they hadn't been to him. With a sinking feeling, she spoke again._

_“What did you mean about the tattoo?” Now that she was thinking differently about their interactions, that crow suddenly looked less like a crow and more like..._

_“A raven over my heart? You really have to ask what that means?” Gar asked incredulously._

_No. She really didn't._

_“I never asked you to get that!” She was almost shrill._

_“Of course you didn't,” Gar scoffed. “I wanted to get it. I thought of it as like an anniversary thing. And you seemed to like it, so—”_

_“Wait a minute,” she interrupted. “What do you mean 'an anniversary thing'?”_

_“I got it exactly one year after we started seeing each other, Rae! It was to, I don't know,_ mark _that!”_

_“Why didn't you talk about an anniversary if you thought this was a relationship!?” Raven demanded, grasping at straws._

_“Because I didn't think you'd be into celebrating anniversaries!” he shot back._

_Raven knew he was right. She wouldn't have been interested in celebrating an anniversary even if she_ had _thought of this as a committed relationship. She'd never seen the point in it. The realization that he knew her_ that well _made another piece of her heart break._

_“So,” Gar continued. “I didn't do anything special that day except get this tattoo. Excuse me for thinking it was a great way to mark the best year of my life! And you know what else?!” By now, he was yelling._

_Raven didn't answer, and he didn't wait for her to._

_“I thought you got it!_ Every _time we had sex after, you couldn't stop touching it!”_

 _“You..._ we _never actually talked about us being a relationship,” Raven said. It was a feeble defense, and she knew it._

_And just like that, most of the rage left Gar's expression. Now, it was pretty much all pain, and Raven almost wished for the anger to come back. For a second, he simply stared at her, hurt and disbelieving._

_“I thought it was obvious, Rae,” he finally said._

_And then he left._

**~O~**

The rest of the lesson, they practiced the waltz without music. Each time they started over, Gar would go a slightly faster speed. When they reached a pace she couldn't follow without stumbling or looking at her feet a lot, they did it at that speed over and over again until she was able to do the steps and look at him the whole time. By the end of the lesson, she knew she was able to do it faster than before, but she was sure she wasn't up to the music's level yet. She no longer doubted her need for daily practice.

That was how their lessons went for the next few days. First, they'd run through the waltz a few times without music to refresh her memory, and then they would add music. They'd play the song once to listen and count, and then they tried dancing to it. Raven got a little bit further into the song each time before she got lost, but she thought her progress was infuriatingly slow. Invariably, Gar had to turn off the music and dance with her without it. They'd go through the dance over and over again, trying to speed it up. Eventually, he started humming the song at a slower tempo to try to get her used to dancing to music, but she didn't think it helped her much. However, it apparently did. By the end of their seventh lesson, she was able to make it all the way through the song, just as Gar promised. She stumbled repeatedly, but she didn't get irredeemably lost.

It was progress.

 


	3. A Taste of Perfection

With the second week of lessons came their second dance: the Viennese Waltz.

It was much easier than their first week of lessons, because there wasn't much to teach. The steps to the Viennese Waltz were practically the same as those of the original. Any variations were slight, and Raven learned them quickly. Her only problem was occasionally mixing up the steps of one waltz with the other.

That, and speed.

Gar didn't tell her until they started working on the Viennese version, but the waltz they did first was often called the “slow waltz.” That was because the Viennese was literally twice as fast, and when they practiced, Raven often felt like her body was moving faster than her brain.

They soon developed a routine. The lesson would start and end with them going over the waltz again to keep it fresh in her mind. It was during this time that he started to change up the songs, because, as he liked to remind her, there was no _one_ song for the waltz. Pretty much any medium tempo song with a ¾ time signature could be used as a waltz. Sometimes, he would just put on the radio, and they would dance to whatever the deejays decided to play. 

The rest of the lesson was devoted to her learning the slightly different steps to the other waltz and trying to speed it up. All in all, it made for a pretty easy week. It was also starting to be, dare she say it, fun. She was actually starting to enjoy dancing with Gar. Maybe it was the dancing. Maybe it was because she felt less awkward around him these days. Either way, Raven liked it.

Even when they started their third week of lessons, Raven didn't feel particularly ill at ease. The tango had completely different steps, and it required them to be much closer than the waltz, but it didn't unsettle her. It was easy to relax now, even if she did stumble often and didn't know what she was doing.

“You're a _real_ girl, now!” Gar teased one day.

“What?” she asked, looking up from their feet and, of course, stumbling. She glared at him.

“Come on, Rae. That was _Pinocchio_! I'm like 83% sure that was a book and like 47% sure you would have read it.”

Getting the joke now, Raven rolled her eyes. “Ha, ha.”

“That was funny,” Gar said stubbornly.

“Sure, it was.”

“For being sassy, you get to start this dance all over again.”

“Oh, the agony.”

Laughing, Gar returned them to the starting position.

**~O~**

_The weeks after her fight and apparent breakup with Gar were some of the worst in Raven's memory. He almost never spoke to her, and he usually ignored her the few times she tried to speak to him. The few times they_ did  _talk, they always ended up fighting, and soon, it began to happen during missions. Whenever_ _Robin, now Nightwing, gave orders that required them to work together, they would get too distracted fighting each other to fight their villain. This always resulted in the others picking up their slack, Nightwing screaming at them when they got back to the tower, and then them screaming at each other again._

_Raven hadn't been this miserable in a long time._

_However, she would go through it all again if Gar standing by the elevator doors with suitcases didn't mean what she thought it did._

_“What's going on?” she asked, hurrying over to him._

_Gar ignored her. That didn't surprise her, but it still hurt._

_“Gar, what's happening?” she asked, putting a hand on his arm._

_He shook her off with a sneer. “Why are you asking? It's not like you care.”_

_“Of course I care,” she said. “You're my...”_

_She trailed off, and he looked at her expectantly. However, his clenched jaw told her that he didn't expect to like what she said next._

_“You're my friend,” she finally said._

_He snorted and turned away from her again. “Yeah. Friend.”_

_She opened her mouth to say something else, but Starfire suddenly appeared, also carrying suitcases._

_Confused, Raven looked between her female friend and the suitcases. “Starfire, you're leaving too?”_

_“Yes,” Starfire replied. “I shall be going to the city of Detroit where I will establish and lead the Titans North. Beast Boy shall be doing the same in the city of Atlanta, with the Titans South.” She sounded sad, but even more, Starfire sounded resigned._

_To Raven, that was worse. It felt like finality. Like they were never coming back._

_“But...why?” she asked._

_“Nightwing believes that our effectiveness as a crime-fighting unit has been compromised,” Starfire spoke mechanically, like she was reciting something she'd read. “To remedy the situation, he has suggested time apart. The establishment of two more teams of heroes is an admirable goal, and I am glad that Nightwing believes us capable enough to lead teams of our own.”_

_“But...he can't just_ make  _you two leave.”_

_“I chose to go,” Gar said stiffly, and Raven felt the barb hit her directly in the heart._

_Knowing he was only trying to hurt her, Raven focused on Starfire. She didn't understand why Nightwing was sending her away. Even though he and Starfire had broken up fairly recently—just a couple of weeks after her and Gar—they got along much better. They didn't fight constantly, and their breakup didn't seem to be getting in the way of their job._

_“It is for the best,” Starfire said after a moment. She looked at Raven and started to tear up. “But I shall miss you, my friend.”_

_With that, she dropped her suitcases and gave Raven a fierce hug. Even though Starfire's strength made it rather painful, Raven returned it and held on even after the alien let go. She only released Starfire when her friend started to move away. The alien bent to pick up her bags._

_“I'll miss you too,” Raven croaked after a moment._

_That was enough to make Starfire burst into tears, and she dropped her bags a second time and hugged Raven._

_“Y-you are a w-wondrous friend, and I love you d-dearly,” Starfire sobbed, and Raven felt a tear slide down her own cheek. She rubbed her face against Starfire's shoulder to wipe it away, and when they separated again, there was no evidence of her tears._

_Starfire took a deep breath and wiped her own tears away. “I shall return when I feel better about being around Ri—Nightwing,” she promised. Then, she turned to Gar._

_“I shall miss you very much as well. I hope you realize that.”_

_Gar smiled a little, and even though Raven knew it wasn't meant for her, she felt her heart lift. He opened his arms, and she almost stepped forward. Starfire launched herself at him before she could though, and he wrapped his arms around her. Raven felt her heart sink once more, leaving only longing._

_“Bye, Kori,” he said softly, and the pretty alien let out a choked sob._

_“Goodbye, Garfield.”_

_Just then, the elevator doors opened. Starfire and Gar walked inside and turned back around. Starfire waved. Gar simply stared at Raven, and she couldn't help but feel like he wanted her to say something, maybe ask him to stay. She wanted to._

_She opened her mouth—maybe to beg him to stay or maybe to just say goodbye—and he looked away._

**~O~**

“I'm curious about something,” Gar commented one day. It was near the end of their third week, and Raven almost had the tango down.

“And what are you curious about?” Raven asked dryly.

“First, I wanna say I don't have a problem doing this for you...”

“That's a relief. I was starting to wonder.” For Raven, that was _almost_ a joke.

“...but I'm still wondering why you didn't ask Dick to teach you,” Gar finished, ignoring her interruption.

Raven stiffened, and Gar frowned.

“Uh-oh,” he said, giving her a little shake. “The wooden puppet is back.”

She tried to relax.

“Is that a bad question?” Gar asked tentatively.

It kind of was, but not for her original reason.

Originally, she hadn't wanted to talk about Dick, because she was still angry with him. Now, she didn't want to talk about him because she was worried about how Gar would react. Things were just starting to feel normal between them again, and she honestly didn't know how Gar would feel if she told him the truth about Dick. However, it seemed unfair to keep it from him, especially since he was spending so much time helping her. When they started moving through the steps of the tango again, Raven reluctantly told him what happened with her and Dick. She left out some things but not much.

**~O~**

_A few days after Gar and Starfire left, Jericho and Pantha came to serve as their replacements. They were nice enough, but they weren't their old friends, and they didn't heal the rift that had formed between the remaining original Titans._

_Cyborg had grown distant, obviously missing their two friends, and it was apparent that he blamed Nightwing for the state of their team. Raven also blamed him at first, but it didn't last long. Through their bond, she could sometimes feel how much he missed them too. However, she could also feel his conviction. He truly believed he'd made the right choice, even if it hadn't been an easy one. Raven respected that and soon forgave him._

_They had been fairly close before, but with relative strangers and a distant friend making up the rest of their team, they inevitably grew closer. Over the next few months, they spent increasing amounts of time together, and then one day, they kissed. It had surprised them both, but they'd enjoyed it. After talking about it, they began a relationship of sorts._

_It wasn't like what either had had before with their previous partners. There was no talk of love or commitment, and Raven could sense that both of them were relieved about this. They simply enjoyed each other's company, and they had sex. Any complaints she'd had about Garfield were absent in Richard. He didn't barge into her room uninvited. Even when he wanted sex, he always politely asked to come in. He didn't try to make her do things outside her comfort zone, always taking even “I don't know”s and “I'm not sure”s as firm “no”s. He didn't try to become overly involved with her life, and she didn't try to mess around in his. They respected each other's independence._

_It was easy, and it was comfortable. Raven enjoyed her time with Richard very much, and if either one felt like something was missing, neither talked about it._

**~O~**

“So, you and Dick had like...a thing?” Gar asked.

Raven could sense his distaste, and she hated it. This was why she didn't want to tell him. Trying to reassure him she quickly added, “It didn't last long.”

“How come?” he asked, making her spin and then pulling her back. “You guys seem like, I dunno, suited.” He didn't look at her when he said this. “You're a lot alike.”

“Too much alike,” Raven said dryly.

**~O~**

_Raven and Dick had been together for nearly six months when things in the tower changed once again. After ten months away, Starfire returned._

_Looking happy and refreshed, she positively gushed about the Titans North. She said they were a delightful and easygoing group who had done their best to make her feel welcome and always worked hard. She had great things to say about each member of her new team. Kole had made a delightful female friend who enjoyed the sleepovers and hair braiding maneuvers as much as Starfire. Hotspot delighted her with his sense of humor. Red Star was warm and steady, and Starfire respected him. She also felt like she was able to speak frankly of her problems to him, because he did not pass judgment, and he always tried to supply her with effective solutions. Starfire also found Gnarrk rather to be sweet once one got past his reticence, and she admired his loyalty. She would miss each of them._

_Raven, thinking that Starfire had only come to visit, was surprised to hear this. “You're not going back?”_

_Dick didn't say anything. He didn't even appear to be paying attention._

_“Well...yes,” Starfire replied. Then her expression became unsure. “Do you...not wish for me to stay?”_

_“Of course I do,” Raven was quick to insist. “I was just surprised. The way you were talking about the Titans North, I thought you would be in a hurry to get back to them.”_

_“I will visit them from time to time,” Starfire replied, “but I do not feel the need to stay with them anymore. I feel they have outgrown my leadership and are ready to run the team on their own.” Starfire smiled. “It was time for me to come home.”_

_Raven smiled a little. “Then, welcome back.” She was quiet for a moment, thinking about her next question, and then she decided to go for it. “Have you heard much from Gar?”_

_“We speak every week or so,” Starfire said lightly, and Raven almost frowned._

_As far as she knew, Gar had called_ their _tower exactly three times, and each time, all he'd done was briefly talk business with Nightwing before hanging up. Raven suspected he used a private line to talk more frequently to Cyborg, but that hadn't bother her much. Cyborg was his best friend after all. However, she wasn't sure how to feel about Gar's frequent conversations with Starfire. All Raven knew for sure was that she didn't like how he had gone the whole ten months without trying to contact_ her _._

_Unaware of Raven's inner turmoil, Starfire continued to speak. “I feel we would talk more often, but we were both quite busy with our teams. One thing I am looking forward to, now that I have returned and am no longer leading, is having more time to call our friends.” She gave Raven a squeeze. “It is truly wonderful to be back.”_

_Still, Dick said nothing._

_Over the next few days, everyone in the tower had questions. The biggest one though was whether Jericho and Pantha needed to stay. Starfire believed that both this team and the Titans North needed five members, and she hinted heavily that Jericho would be welcome in Detroit. A certain pink-haired heroine with a large friend thought highly of him._

_Jericho left a day later, and Pantha agreed to stay until further notice._

_With Starfire back, things improved in the tower. The distance between Raven, Dick, and Cyborg began to diminish, and it started to feel like old times. Dick and Starfire were still a bit distant, but it was to be expected. Overall, things were pleasant, and Raven's contentment continued to grow._

**~O~**

Before Raven could finish her story, a piercing wail rent the air, and the lights began to flash red. The crime alert.

Gar gave her a look tinged with regret and then shrugged. “Duty calls.”

She nodded and teleported to her room to change.

Their mission was successful, but Nightwing still felt the need to put them through extra training the next day. They worked together and then alone. When he finally said they were done, it was three-thirty. Raven wasn't sure if she and Gar would be having their lesson today, but she went by the gym to check anyway. He was there, but he didn't seem to be there for dancing. He was shirtless, and he faced away from her, his attention on the punching bag he was beating.

“Gar?” she asked.

“Yeah, Rae?” he called, not looking away from the bag.

“Are we still having our...lesson today?”

“Oh!” he exclaimed, apparently having forgotten. “Yeah, just give me a couple of minutes.” He turned around, and Raven's gaze was riveted to his chest.

The tattoo was still there.

As Gar moved across the room to get a towel, she stared at his chest. Knowing what she knew now, she found there was something distinctly feminine about the lines that made up the bird and the swirls around it that represented wind. It seemed obvious now that the tattoo would symbolize a woman. She didn't know how she had ever mistaken it for a simple crow.

“You think I should take a shower or do you want to get started right away?” Gar asked.

She didn't answer.

“Raven?” He sounded concerned.

“Someone said you had your tattoo removed,” she said without thinking. She couldn't remember who told her that.

He looked down at his chest, and Raven could see a bit of redness blooming beneath the green skin of his cheeks.

“I didn't,” he said lamely. He looked annoyed for a second, but Raven was mostly sure that it wasn't directed at her.

A moment later, he elaborated, looking pointedly at the floor. “I think of it—and what it means—as, like, a part of me, y'know? I can't just make it go away. And I don't really want to.” Suddenly, he looked up. “And I  _swear_ there's no pressure behind that. None at all.”

Raven smiled slightly. “I understand.”

“So...” He rubbed the back of his neck. “You think I should shower?”

“I honestly don't care,” Raven replied, grateful for the change in subject. “I haven't showered. Do you want to?”

He shrugged. “Kinda yes and kinda no. I think if I do take a shower though, I'll just go ahead and get some food and then take a nap.”

“So, we should go ahead and get this over with?” Raven asked.

“If that's okay.”

“That's fine.”

He went to the stereo, put a song on, and then pulled her into the starting position for the waltz. They ran through it three times, and Raven thought it went very well. She didn't stumble or look at her feet once, and she had almost no trouble staying on tempo. The song changed, and then it was time for the Viennese waltz. They did this one four times, and Raven made a couple of mistakes during the first two runs. However, the last two were fine, and Raven was pleased with her progress.

From there, they moved on to the tango. They had started adding music to it, and even though it was about the same speed as the waltz, Raven found it pretty easy to keep up with. She supposed that was because she had the speed of the Viennese waltz to compare it to. However, she started making mistakes towards the end, and she let out a frustrated huff.

“You really are doing great, Rae,” Gar said sincerely. “It took me much longer to do all these dances this well, at least a month or two.”

“Amazing,” she said dryly. “Now, I'm better than a ten year old who's had a month or two of dance lessons.”

“It's something,” Gar said, lips twitching.

“Stop looking happy,” Raven groused, but she was trying not to smile as well.

“Yes, ma'am.”

They danced in companionable silence for a while, and then Gar said it would soon be time for them to end the lesson. Knowing what that meant, Raven returned to the starting position for the waltz. Once they'd started their first run, Gar spoke again.

“You know, you still owe me a story. You can't just leave me hanging like that.”

“I know.”

Raven had just been hoping he wouldn't bring it up.

**~O~**

_Things in the tower were good. So obviously, they had to go bad._

_One day, Raven was walking back to her room from the roof. She'd just finished meditating. As she passed the gym, she heard a familiar giggle, but that wasn't what made her stop. Starfire giggling was not an unusual occurrence._

_No. What made her stop was the equally familiar male groan that came after it._

_She wasn't really thinking when she looked into the gym, and perhaps that was why she was shocked by what she saw._

_Dick and Starfire were on the floor in a tangled heap. His shirt was missing, and hers was pushed up, along with her sports bra, to bare her breasts. They were kissing fiercely, hands grasping at each other like they never wanted to let go._

_She must have made a noise, maybe gasped, because Dick suddenly looked up, and his face drained of color._

_“Raven!” he called. “Wait—”_

_She disappeared in a swirl of black energy._

**~O~**

“He cheated on you?!” Gar exclaimed. He looked as furious as he did the day they broke up, and Raven almost stepped back.

“He did,” she confirmed, her tone cautious.

He stopped dancing and stepped away, taking a deep breath. He kept looking at the door, and Raven wondered if he would run off to confront Dick. The thought filled her with dread. After a moment though, he seemed to calm down a bit. However, he still sounded angry when he spoke again. “And Kori just went along with it! Why would she do that?!” He threw his hands up in the air.

Raven gave a kind of half-shrug. “She didn't know.”

**~O~**

_Starfire found her first._

_It was midnight, and Raven was essentially hiding in the house that she hoped would one day become her youth home. When she heard a knock at the door, she opened it to find Starfire standing on the porch, tears pouring down her face. Raven almost shut it again immediately, but Starfire gripped the edge of the door and stopped her._

_“Please, Raven! I am so sorry! I did not mean to cause you pain!”_

_“And what did you think having an affair with Dick would do?” Raven asked coldly._

_“It was not an affair!” Starfire cried. “That was the first time our interaction has been anything but platonic since the end of our relationship!”_

_“And how am I supposed to believe that?”_

_“I do not know, but it is true! I swear to you, Raven. Had I known you and Richard were romantically involved, I would not have allowed—”_

_“Wait, what do you mean 'you didn't know'?” Raven interrupted. She was confused. “Dick didn't tell you?”_

_“Neither of you told me.” Starfire's tone took on a hint of bitterness for a moment, but then she shook her head. “But that is no excuse. I should have asked Dick if he were 'free' before I,” She shuddered in obvious self-loathing._ “pounced  _upon him like the starved grishnik.”_

_Raven felt her icy rage begin to thaw._

_“One of us should have told you,” she admitted. “I didn't, because I wasn't sure how to do it without hurting your feelings. I'm sorry.”_

_“I am more the sorry,” Starfire sniffed. “I have ruined your relationship.”_

_Raven sighed. “I think there was something wrong with it before this, Kori. You just... made it obvious.”_

_“But I did not wish to. I would give anything to be able to take back my actions.”_

_“I believe you would,” Raven replied, and she truly did. “But what's done is done.”_

_“I understand.” Kori let out a choked sob. “I will return to the Titans North.”_

_“What?! No. You don't have to do that,” Raven said firmly._

_“But why would you want to see me, be around me at all?”_

**~O~**

“Why would you though?” Gar asked, “Either of them?”

“It was hard at first,” Raven admitted. “But you know Kori is useless when it comes to lying. If she said it was just one time, then it was just one time, and if she said she didn't know Dick and I were together, then she didn't know. I know for sure I didn't tell her. And Kori's loved Dick for over ten years. Obviously, if she thought he was free,  _something_ would have happened. I couldn't really blame her for any of this, and I couldn't just let her leave.”

“You still seem pretty pissed at Dick though,” Gar pointed out.

“Dick  _did_ know he was with someone else, and he cheated anyway.”

“Ah,” Gar replied, understanding instantly.

“I also feel like he believed, on some level, that he had the right to cheat on me.”

“Why the _hell_ would he think that?” Gar looked disgusted. 

Raven thought about how she would explain it to him, and she finally settled for: “I wasn't as devoted to him as I could have been. As I should have been.” She corrected.

“That's bullshit,” Gar replied immediately. “That didn't give him  _the right_ to cheat on you.”

“It didn't, but...”

“But what?”

“Nothing. But nothing. He didn't have the right to cheat on me,” Raven said decisively, and she truly believed that.

However, she couldn't help but think about one of the last real conversations she'd had with Dick.

**~O~**

_He found her the next morning._

_Raven was on the roof, watching the sun rise. She didn't turn to look at him, but she could feel him next to her. From the corner of her eye, she could see he looked miserable. Good._

_“Raven,” he started. “I am_ so _so—”_

_“You know,” she interrupted. “I didn't think we'd be perfect. No relationship is, but I honestly thought we would come pretty close. We're so similar.”_

_If it had been her style, she would have let out an ironic chuckle. “We're both introverted, serious, independent, afraid of commitment. We understood those things about each other and respected them.”_

_“Raven...” Dick tried again._

_“Now, I realize we're too much alike.” Raven took a deep breath to prepare herself for what she was going to say next. “Right down to being stuck on someone we probably shouldn't have let go.”_

_There. She said it._

_Dick was silent for several seconds, and Raven chanced a glance at him out of the corner of her eye. He looked thoughtful. She looked back out at the bay, and after a few more moments of silence, he spoke._

_“You say Gar's name in your sleep.”_

_“I probably do,” she agreed, even though she hadn't known that._

_“It happens a lot.”_

_Raven heard bitterness begin to creep into his tone, and for the first time, she turned to face him. She raised an eyebrow. “Considering the circumstances of this conversation, I don't think you get to be angry about that.”_

_Just like that, any ire Dick might have been feeling seemed to disappear. “I know,” he admitted. “And not that it means much right now, but I am sorry for what I did.”_

_Raven looked away again. “I accept your apology.”_

_“You're still angry,” Dick observed._

_“I said I accepted your apology.” Her tone was cool. “I didn't say I was ready to forgive you.”_

_Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Dick nod. He understood._

 


	4. Thinking Out Loud

Over the next few weeks, it took Raven longer and longer to learn the remaining dances. It wasn't because they were any harder than the first few. Rather, it was because Gar spent as much time reviewing the old dances as he did teaching the new ones. At the beginning and end of each lesson, they would run through every dance Raven had learned at least twice.

Raven couldn't really complain though. With the gala only a week away, she could say with some certainty that she was great at both waltzes, pretty good at the tango and foxtrot, and passable at the quickstep. Those were the five dances Gar had agreed to teach her, and she was certain that by the end of the week, she would be able to do them all without embarrassing herself.

Raven could also admit that she really enjoyed dancing, at least with Gar. She liked being close to him again, moving with him. She liked knowing what he was going to do next and trusting that he knew what to expect from her. She avoided comparing their dancing to their old relationship, but she had no problem thinking of their former friendship and camaraderie. She'd missed that and enjoyed having it back.

But then Gar started _deviating._ Now that she was able to do the steps for the dances, he decided to throw the rules out the window. Whenever they ran the old dances at the end of the lesson, he did all sorts of things he didn't before. He went fast. He went slow. He added unnecessary spins and turns and wildly kicked or threw his arms out. He pulled her close enough to make her breathless, his body pressing hard into hers, and his recent habit of going shirtless made that particular move even worse for Raven. Other times, he would suddenly pull away from her entirely and do this own thing. His behavior frustrated Raven immensely. 

“ _What_ are you doing?!” she demanded, her rising irritation finally getting the better of her. 

“Now's when dancing actually gets  _fun,_ Rae!” he exclaimed, choosing to ignore her annoyance. 

“What are you talking about?”

“Spontaneousness!” he yelled. Suddenly, he grabbed her hand, yanked her back to him, and tried to dip her.

She wasn't expecting it, so when he tried pushing her down, she clutched at his back, desperately trying to keep herself vertical, because she was _certain_ he was going to drop her. Suddenly, she noticed that he was wincing, and she realized that her nails were probably digging into his bare back.

Good. It served him right for being so annoying.

“The word,” she said flatly, “is spontaneity.”

“Blah, blah, grammar,” he replied dismissively. He straightened, pulling her with him, and once both her feet were flat on the ground, he let her go. “We're here to  _dance,_ Rae!”

Rolling her eyes, Raven couldn't help but be reminded of their first lesson, when he'd jokingly put on the persona of an overenthusiastic dance instructor. Now, it seemed he was getting a little _too_ into the role. She thought about telling him this, but she dismissed the idea. Instead, she gave him a disdainful look and said:

“We are here to dance. Not flail around or whatever it was you were doing. I could have done that without the two months of lessons.”

He looked offended. “That was not  _flailing._ It was  _dancing._ It's supposed to be fun.”

“Whatever,” Raven replied. She held out her hand. “I want to run through the quickstep again.  _No_ flailing,” she added, giving him a warning look. 

He let out an exasperated sigh and took her hand. Pulling her into the starting position, he started to dance, and this time he behaved. After a moment, he spoke again.

“You know, Rae, the steps and junk are what make this stuff, like, an art form, but the 'spontaneity' is why people still want to do it.”

“So, why bother learning the steps?” she wondered out loud, still feeling a bit frustrated.

He caught her gaze, and she was struck by just how intense his look was.

“You gotta learn the rules,” he said. “what you're expected to do, and then you work in and around it to make it fun. That part was probably the hardest for me to learn.”

Raven held his gaze for a moment and then looked down at her feet.

For some reason, she felt like he wasn't talking about dancing anymore.

**~O~**

When the lesson started the next day, Raven was still thinking about what Gar had said. The way he'd looked at her, the way he'd _made sure_ she was looking at him, convinced her that he was trying to tell her something that didn't have much to do with dancing. Part of her thought that maybe he was referring to what had happened to between them. Another part of her thought that was her own wishful thinking talking, but that part was mostly ignored. 

Gar had talked about rules and expectations. He said it was important to know what they were before you could work around them and be spontaneous. He also said that was the hardest thing for him to learn. How did that apply to their relationship?

She remembered that during their fight, her defense had been that they had never talked about being in a relationship. However, she knew now that they had never talked about it being “just sex” either. Everything between them had just happened. It was...spontaneous. It had been spontaneous and wonderful and  _baseless._ There had been no rules. They'd never talked about what they had expected from one another, so everything fell apart. 

Raven almost stopped in the middle of the dance.

Gar gave her a tug and a puzzled look, and she hastily moved to where she was supposed to be. Once she was back in place, she immediately started thinking about her revelation. She was certain that  _this_ was the point Gar had been trying to make yesterday, but why was he saying it? Did he want to tell her that he knew where they went wrong? Did he want her to understand so they could get back together? Did he just want to clear the air so he could move on? Why couldn't he have been more direct? 

_Maybe he really_ was  _just talking about dancing,_ said a dry voice in her mind.

_But he acted weird about it!_ another voice pointed out. 

She wished that Gar hadn't picked  _now_ to be anything other than completely obvious. The dance ended, and Raven was pulled from her thoughts when she realized that Gar wasn't leading her through another one. Focusing on his face, she realized that his lips were curled into a devious smile. She opened her mouth to ask what was going on, but before she could speak, he suddenly yanked her close to him.

“We're working on spontaneousness again, Rae!” he yelled.

“Spontaneity,” she corrected in monotone.

“Whatever the hell it is!” His tone was flippant. He immediately let her go and made his way to the stereo. He removed his iPod, which had been playing his playlist of quickstep songs, and turned on the radio instead. It began to blare some pop song with a vaguely Latin beat. He danced back to her and gripped her hand. Spinning her to him, he launched into a slightly sped up tango.

Again, Gar threw all the rules out the window, adding unnecessary movements and goofing off. However, Raven found it wasn't as irritating as before. It might have been because this time she was focusing on him, rather than her own confusion and annoyance. Grinning widely, he was clearly enjoying himself, and he looked like he was off in his own world. Raven wondered why this... _flailing_ seemed to make him so happy. Was it because he finally had a chance to goof off, or was it something else? Considering what he said yesterday, Raven felt compelled to think it was something else. Maybe, he liked goofing off like this because he felt _secure_ enough to? He knew the steps and could go back to them if something went wrong? 

Raven shook her head. No matter what was going on with him,  _she_ was definitely thinking too much. Maybe she should take a leaf from his book for a while. 

The song changed, and Gar started her on the Viennese waltz. When he spun her out, her arm flared out almost of its own volition, and she cocked her hip. She pretended not to notice his smile when she spun back to him. After that, she started doing her own little things, growing braver the wider Gar's smile became. She kicked and spun and posed and whirled, a small smile appearing on her face. When Gar dipped her, her hands dropped from his neck, and she arched her back so her fingers grazed the floor. She'd seen it in a movie once.

“Oh...you're having fun now!” Gar exclaimed, obviously thrilled with her. The thought made her smile a little wider.

“I actually am,” she admitted after he pulled her up.

Their dancing was relaxed and close and  _fun_ , and even though the steps weren't always what she expected anymore, Raven didn't feel ill at ease. She still felt like she knew what Gar was going to do next and still trusted him to know about her. 

“You see what I mean about spontaneousness?”

“You mean 'spontaneity'?” she asked sardonically. Still smiling slightly, she raised an eyebrow at him.

“What _ever_ !” he groaned. “Do you get the point though, you grammar Nazi?”

“Yes, I do. It's fun.” Taking a chance, she caught his eye and held it. “Probably even more so because we both know what to expect. We know the rules now, so we can work around them.”

For a long time, he simply stared at her. Even as the song on the radio ended and their dance slowed, his eyes remained on hers. His expression had lost all traces of lightheartedness.

She held her breath, waiting for him to say something. Another song began to play, and she recognized the opening notes of Ed Sheeran's “Thinking Out Loud.” Still not speaking—and still not taking his eyes off her—he began to lead her through another dance.

Had she not been so emotionally disciplined, Raven would have begun to fidget under his intense gaze. The obviously romantic song playing around them did little to ease the tension. Without thinking, she bit her lip when she heard the lyric “ _will your mouth still remember the taste of my love,_ ” and his gaze snapped to her mouth. She nearly flinched. When his eyes returned to hers, she didn't think she could look away if she tried. 

For what felt like a long time, neither spoke. They simply watched each other, pulling each other closer and closer as the dance went on. By the middle of the song, barely an inch of space separated them, and Raven noticed that Gar was still deviating. The hand that usually stayed at her waist stroked up and down her back, and she tried not to sigh at the feeling. He skipped over spins and turns, keeping her as close as possible, and Raven didn't try to correct him or move away. She didn't want to.

“We did this before,” she said hoarsely. Instantly, she feared that she'd broken whatever spell had come over them.

However, Gar merely nodded, still keeping her close. “We did.”

“It ended badly.”

“Yeah, it did,” he agreed.

“Should we stop?” She  _really_ didn't want to stop. 

His gaze never left hers, but he cocked his head in the direction of the door. “Door's over there.”

That wasn't the answer she'd been hoping for.

“Is that what you want?” she asked, trying to keep her voice as neutral as his.

“I feel like what I want should be obvious, Rae.”

She gave him a half-smile that contained no mirth, only ruefulness. “The last time we did this, we found out that I should probably have these things explained to me.”

Gar smiled a little at that.

_“I'll just keep on making the same mistakes, hoping that you'll understand!”_ Ed Sheeran added, and Raven smiled a little as well.

For several seconds, they continued to dance, neither speaking. His lack of reply worried her, but Raven tried to take comfort in the fact that he hadn't let go of her yet. She found her eyes drawn to his bare chest.

_“Place your hand on my beating heart...”_

Her hand slid from his shoulder to rest on his heart. Almost by itself, her palm moved in a slow circle over the raven tattoo. His hand suddenly gripped hers, stopping it, and he spun her out. When he pulled her back in, there was no space between them. Her body was pressed tight against his, and his lips grazed the shell of her ear when he spoke. 

“I want you to stay right here.”

She shuddered as the words flowed over her ear.

He wrapped both arms around her, pulling her so tight against him that she could no longer move. The dance had stopped.

“I want sex and dates and hanging out with our friends. I want an  _actual_ relationship, where I can say I love you without getting dumped.”

She let out a choked gasp at that.

“Your turn now, Raven. What do you want?”

She didn't have to think about her answer.

“You,” she rasped.

“Just sex?” Now, his tone was anything but neutral.

Raven buried her face in his neck and shook her head no.

“Then what?”

Taking a breath, she looked him in the eye.

“Sex and dates and hanging out with our friends,” she parroted. “An actual relationship, where you can say 'I love you' without getting dumped.” She took another deep breath, preparing herself for what she was going to say next. “And where I'll say it back.”

Gar froze, thunderstruck.

Raven worried that she might have said too much. “Gar?”

“You love me?” he croaked.

Tentatively, she nodded. She opened her mouth to actually say it as well, but his mouth closed over hers before she could. Her eyes dropped shut, and she let out a relieved moan.

It was like coming home. The kiss was tender and all-consuming, and she felt warmth blooming under her skin. Her heart ached with love and nostalgia as her hands slid up his chest to tangle in his hair. God, she'd missed this. She'd missed  _him_ . When they broke apart, he laid his forehead against hers. She extricated her hands from his hair and clasped them together at the nape of his neck. 

“Missed you,” he said softly.

“Missed you too.”

**~O~**

The next day, they met in the gym at the usual time. They ran through the waltzes, tango, and foxtrot a couple of times each, and then he moved to the stereo to put on his quickstep playlist. Raven was still having trouble with this particular dance, because it was even faster than the Viennese waltz, but Gar was patient. After working on the dance for about an hour, he turned on the radio, and they ran through the old dances again. It all seemed so typical, and Raven wondered how it could be like that when everything between them had changed.

“Focus on your dancing,” Gar said, pulling her from her thoughts. He gave her a little shake. “You don't get to slack off because the instructor's your boyfriend.” His smile was teasing, but Raven could see the question in his eyes.

“I'm not _slacking off,_ ” she said stubbornly.

“Your head's somewhere else,” he insisted.

“Still not slacking,” she replied. “So, my 'instructor boyfriend' shouldn't worry.”

Gar smiled widely at that, and she gave him a small smile in return. He guided her into an unnecessary dip, one hand sliding down her side, and it made Raven think about how today really wasn't typical at all, despite how it looked.

In addition to the banter, they... _touched_ now. Raven thought the dancing had been close before, but now the boundaries between them had all but disappeared. It seemed like his hands were everywhere when they were dancing. They stroked up and down her back, grazed her sides, gripped her hips, and slid down her arms to her hands. They were always moving, and from anyone else, the constant touches would have annoyed Raven. But with him, she found herself doing the same thing.

He held her hand to guide her through the dances, and her thumb continuously stroked the back and knuckles of his hand. The hand that was supposed to remain on his shoulder was even busier. Sometimes, her fingers would drift up to play with the hair at the back of his neck. Other times, they would slide down his arm and tangle with the fingers of his other hand. Mostly though, her hand would find its way to the raven tattoo, and she would trace its lines or simply lay her palm against it and feel his heartbeat beneath the ink. She'd missed being free to touch him like this, and she reveled in her ability to do so again.

Once again, Gar's voice pulled her from her thoughts. “You know, that day you asked me to teach you to dance, I thought you were about to ask me to this fancy party thing.”

“Really?” Raven asked, surprised. The thought had never occurred to her.

“Yep,” he said with a nod. “I thought you were going to ask me 'as a friend,' and I _really_ wasn't looking forward to that.”

“I imagine you weren't,” Raven said quietly. It saddened her to think about it. She made eye contact with him. “Why are you telling me this anyway?”

“Because I think I want to ask _you_ to this gala thing. And I do mean as a date.”

She gave him a wry look.

“What?” he laughed. “I just want to make sure you know this time!”

“You still haven't asked me yet,” she pointed out.

“You want to be my date to this party?”

“Okay.”

“Okay, like...?”

Raven rolled her eyes. “Okay, like it's a date. We are going as a couple. Clear enough?”

“Yep,” Gar replied cheekily, “thank you, Rae.”

**~O~**

Raven was in a dress, her face was painted, and she'd been forced to give a speech.

However, those were the only complaints she had about the mayor's gala. Responding to questions wasn't nearly as hard as she thought it would be. She found herself able and willing to talk about the youth home for longer than she'd ever talked about anything else. It helped that most of the reporters kept their questions on that subject. The few that tried to press for extraneous information—like why she was attending this party with “Changeling”—were quickly steered back to the proper subject. She found that she liked talking to benefactors even more. Most of them asked polite, thoughtful questions, and she didn't feel like she was being forced to give a sales pitch. She had good feelings about nearly all of them.

She also didn't make a fool of herself on the dance floor. However, that might have been because she didn't try dancing with that many partners. There were a couple of reporters, and a couple of potential benefactors, but once they let her go, she was back with Gar. She found liked dancing much better when it was with him.

**~O~**

Across the ballroom, Kori watched Raven and Gar with warm smile on her face. They were lovely when they danced. They moved like each knew what the other was thinking, and they looked at each other like they were the only ones in the room. Kori was delighted for her friends.

“They are glorious together, are they not?” she asked the man at her side.

Dick followed her gaze and smiled slightly at the sight of his friends. “Yeah. They are. It's good to see that they're not awkward around each other anymore.”

“I believe they have restarted their romantic relationship.”

Dick turned to Kori, surprise crossing over his features. “Really?” He hadn't expected this when he asked Gar to return. He'd hoped for it, for Raven's sake, but he'd tried not to expect too much. “They haven't said anything though. How can you tell?”

“Well, look at them,” Kori replied, gesturing at them.

“They're...dancing?” Dick guessed. Friends could do that.

Kori made an exasperated noise and gestured more emphatically. “Yes, but it is the _way_ they are dancing. And you cannot have missed how they behave around one another.”

Dick admitted that he probably had, and Kori made another frustrated noise. However, there was some affection behind it.

“Ever since they have begun the dance lessons, they have grown more comfortable in each other's presence. And they talk more often. They also touch one another more frequently, and they share the secret smiles, and they have shared meals, and—it is blatantly obvious they have done the falling in love, Richard!”

Dick turned his attention back to his friends and observed them for several long moments. He saw how slow Raven was to move away from Gar when a wealthy looking man asked her to dance. He saw how Gar watched Raven and her partner intently, barely sparing the pretty blonde who sidled up to him a glance. The second the dance was over, Raven quickly thanked the man and was back in Gar's arms. They started to dance, and Dick could see that they were holding each other much closer than the dance required. They also moved together with an ease that he knew from experience was rare. Dick could also see that they were both smiling, something that was rare for Raven, and even from across the room, he could see the warmth and affection in her eyes. Dick idly noted that she'd never looked at _him_ like that.

However, he didn't hold it against her too much. He clearly hadn't been as invested in their relationship as he should have been either. He'd tried to make up for his mistakes by bringing Gar home, but that only seemed to make Raven angrier. However, now that things were better between the two of them, maybe Raven would be able to forgive him. He didn't want her back, but he did miss having her as a friend. He turned back at Kori.

“Would it bother you if I danced with Raven for a minute?”

Kori looked unsure, and Dick bit back a sigh. He knew he'd set a dangerous precedent by cheating on Raven. It would be a long time before either really trusted him again, and Dick knew he had no one to blame but himself.

“I just want to ask her about Gar. I'd ask him, but I don't think he'll dance with me.”

Kori smiled reluctantly at that, but she still looked unsure.

Dick gently took her face in his hands and looked her in the eye. “You'll be able to see us the whole time.”

Tentatively, she nodded, and he gave her a reassuring smile.

“Now, could you do something for me?”

**~O~**

“May I do the cutting in?”

Raven and Gar turned to see Kori standing beside them, a hopeful smile on her face. Gar gave Raven a questioning look, and she nodded.

He turned back to their friend. “Sure, Kori. Let's dance.”

Stepping away from Raven, he took Kori's hand and led the pretty alien a few feet away. He began to lead her through the waltz, and Raven smiled a little at the sight. Her smile quickly disappeared when she felt someone grab her hand. The mysterious person pulled her arm until she turned completely around, and she found herself face to face with Richard.

“Hey, Raven,” he said quietly.

She stiffened but didn't step away, and they began to dance.

“I know you probably don't want to talk to me...”

“The feelings are mixed,” Raven interrupted. She didn't really _want_ to talk to Dick, but she knew she had to eventually. They couldn't go on this like forever.

Dick looked uncomfortable. “That's better than total anger, I suppose.”

They turned, and over Dick's shoulder, Raven saw that Gar had noticed them and was trying to get away from Kori. The alien's strength kept him back easily, and he didn't look happy about it. Raven caught Gar's eye and shook her head. Hopefully, he would understand that she was fine. He seemed to, because he stopped trying to wiggle out of Kori's hold, but he continued to watch them like a hawk. Raven looked back at Dick.

“What did you want to talk about?”

Dick was quiet for a moment, like he was trying to choose his words carefully. After a moment, he finally said, “I noticed things are going well between you and Gar.”

“We are officially dating. Commitment and everything.” Raven smiled sardonically.

Dick smiled as well, but his was more genuine. “I'm glad. I wish you two the best.”

She gave him an unimpressed look. “Was it really necessary for you to come over here and interrupt my time with Gar to tell me that, Richard?”

He fidgeted under her gaze. “No. I suppose it wasn't, but...” He sighed. “I miss you.”

Outraged, Raven's mouth dropped open. How _dare_ he—

“ _Not_ like that,” he added quickly. “I miss my friend.”

“I miss your friendship too,” Raven said grudgingly. “But you wronged me. And Kori.”

“I know,” he replied, looking at the floor, and Raven could feel how guilty he was. “I'm trying to make up for it though. That was one of the reasons I brought Gar back.”

“Really?” Raven asked, surprised.

“Yeah,” Dick replied. “Obviously, he was the one you wanted, and I thought bringing him back would make you happy. And make you less angry at me.”

She sighed. “I still need time, Dick.”

“I know.”

He looked so miserable that Raven couldn't help but add: “But thank you for bringing Gar back. That was a very good first step.”

Dick let out a half-hearted chuckle. “I'm glad you think so.”

“I'll forgive you eventually, Dick,” she said sincerely. “I just need time.”

“That's fair,” he replied.

Just then, the song ended, and Gar was back at her side so suddenly it was like he teleported. Without speaking to Dick, he took Raven's arm and led her away. Once they were a safe distance away, he put one of her hands on his shoulder and took the other one in his own. Then, he placed his free hand at the small of her back, and they began to dance once more.

“What did Dick want?” he asked after a moment.

“To say he's happy for us,” Raven said simply.

“He had to be alone with you to do that?” he groused.

“You're _not_ jealous?”  Raven asked incredulously. The idea that he was worried about _Dick_ of all people was laughable.

Gar didn't answer.

“Gar?”

“You guys had a thing!” His tone was defensive.

“And it ended,” Raven reminded him. “Because he wanted Kori.” She touched his cheek. “And I wanted you.”

Gar gave her a half-hearted smile, but he still looked a bit worried.

She put her other hand on the other side of his face and made sure that he was looking in her eyes. “I wanted you,” she repeated. “And now that I have you, I don't plan on giving you up any time soon.”

That seemed to reassure him, and when “Thinking Out Loud” began to play, he laughed softly.

“Must be a sign,” he observed.

“Must be,” Raven repeated, smiling at the song as well. They danced for a while, enjoying each other's company, and then Gar spoke again.

“Are _you_ okay?”

Raven raised her eyebrows in confusion. “What do you mean?”

Gar cocked his head in Dick's direction. “Dude you're still pissed at for cheating on you got up in your space. You okay?”

“I'm fine,” Raven replied. She moved her hand from Gar's shoulder to his chest, placing her palm over where the tattoo was beneath his dress shirt. “I'm actually pretty good.”

 


End file.
